Shy
A Novel
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Shy
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Narrated by:
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Joe Gaminara
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Written by:
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Max Porter
About this listen
One of The New Yorker’s Best Books of 2023
In a dilapidated mansion, in the middle of the night, a young man is considering what could be his final decision in this world.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
The floorboards complain.
He checks again, the spliff is diagonal-snug in the empty Embassy box.
The daytime check is a half-dream away.
The room is molten soft. Tempting.
Jumpy.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
It’s 3:13 a.m.
Shy. A troubled teen, a "dangerous young man," a reject from the social structures that no longer wish to nurture him. Shy knows that society has not failed him, he has failed it—parents, schooling, friends and sometime girlfriends. Judged and found wanting, he now lives at Last Chance, a boarding school for boys like him.
Set over a few hours of a single evening, Shy exists between the stillness and beauty of a nocturne and the exhilarating shout of simultaneous teenage joy and anguish. With leaps of linguistic brilliance and wild energy, this is an utterly immersive novel in its authenticity and heart-breaking honesty. As with all Porter’s writing, the darkness is indivisible from a core of humour and humanity. It is his greatest feat of empathy yet.
©2023 Max Porter (P)2023 Strange LightWhat the critics say
"Porter blends verse and prose to create books that aren’t quite poems, but aren’t quite novels in the traditional sense, either.[…] Amid the book’s gloom, Porter found some room for levity in the darkness, breaking up the mood with playful turns of phrase[…]”—New York Times
“The words [Max Porter writes] are absolutely beautiful to say. Like all good writing, the more you say them, the more they reveal.”—Cillian Murphy
“Max Porter has a way of writing unlike anyone else. I loved Shy. I finished it elated and tearful, joyful and terrified, changed by the journey. It moved me and surprised me and that is what I look for in my favourite artists.”—PJ Harvey